Blasphemous Rumours
by James Is A Dalek
Summary: [Sequel to Toxicity] House uncovers something that endangers the entire Hospital, while Wilson is lured into temptation.
1. Chapter 1

_For you who were left hanging by the ending of Toxicity, I'm sure this first, fluff-filled chapter will set the scene in your head. (: _

**Blasphemous Rumours**

Monday morning, the middle of autumn.

Through the many doors and windows of Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital a steady, bright gaze of sunlight filtered to the floors, casting off the gloom and shadows that lingered from the heavy storms of the night prior. People bustled too and fro, moving from ward to ward with the soft light accentuating their features. It glossed over imperfections, somehow boycotted the stains and taints that afflicted every soul to walk to floors, bringing an odd sense of calm, of satisfaction to each one of them.

Perhaps, just perhaps, in the light of that morning, life wasn't so bad.

Staring out of one of such windows, through the blinds of his office, even Dr. Gregory House could be said to have been in a better state of mind than usual. No frown or worry nor scowl of disapproval creased his brow, while neither anger or sadness was visible in his eyes. There was no pain to be seen over his features, and no sarcastic comments pulling at his lips.

It was, for possibly the first time, peaceful. Everything seemed so quiet, so passive. He had been in his office for three hours, and not once had he been treated to Cuddy's nag of the week. He hadn't seen hide nor hair of his Ducklings, and nobody had spoken a word about Clinic Duty. If it hadn't been for the light pressure of a hand against his stomach and the soft melodies stemming from his iPod, House may have been tricked into thinking he was still in a state of slumber.

"Greg?" Wilson whispered softly into his ear, standing close to House's back. His hands were rest upon the man's stomach, holding him. Against his chest, Wilson felt House shift a little as he spoke, as if the voice had cracked into the bliss of the silence. Nuzzling into his shoulder, Wilson pulled himself a little closer.

"I'm fine." House muttered, still staring out of the window. Several floors beneath them, he could see pinpricks of people swanning about in their daily lives. They looked too small to be real, too small to have illnesses. Too small to need their help.

"I know." A slightly world-worn smile took to Wilson's lips, and he shifted his balance a little to let his lips brush over House's stubbled jaw. As House twisted his head back, however, Wilson was given the satisfaction of a full kiss, releasing his grip on Greg's stomach to allow the man to turn and face him.

It had been months since they had first touched, first kissed, and yet James was still able to find something in them that gave him chills. As Greg guided him back into the desk, he felt the familiar tremble shoot down his spine, shoulders jutting outwards slightly in their usual, vain attempt to counteract the movements. In his customary way, House noticed, smirking at the fact his actions were still able to elicit such reactions.

If they were settling into a pattern, it wasn't showing through. Wilson's breath was trapped in his throat as House moved away from his lips and started on his shoulder. Hot, rapid breath pounded as his skin as the other sucked on the skin, pleasure amplified by the sensitive arc of muscle that clenched beneath. Tilting his head back some, James allowed a small muttered 'yeah' fall from his lips, now aching for House to move lower still.

His wish was easily granted, and – before he had an opportunity to to think about what was happening – House's fingers were toying around his groin, heightening his arousal with each gentle touch. For a man whose appearance and thoughts were so crude and abrasive, he was able to work with a certain fineness. Pressing himself back into the desk, the edge biting deep into his lower back, Wilson was subjected to the downside of such a fineness. It felt like an endless torment, just waiting for him to finally stroke the right spots.

"So impatient." He heard House mutter, slowly tugging down the zipper on his pants. The glare of the sun was very evident against his neck, and House found himself uncomfortable in his very clothes. Too warm, too hot... they were in a glass cube, more or less, but nobody would be checking in on them...

"Oh!"

Looking up sharply, House was somewhat startled by the voice. For a start, it wasn't coming from Wilson. Secondly, it was female. Thirdly, it was far too familiar for his liking. Dr. Cameron, standing in the doorway and acting like she'd never read slash on the Internet.

"I...erm—yeah..." She averted her eyes, hair falling over her face a little as she tilted her head to hide the flush of her cheeks. She heard House grumble something to Wilson, he sighing in return.

"What is it?"

"I, erm... I got a, uh, a message. Cuddy." Cameron blinked rapidly at the floor, wishing she could just rewind and completely bypass this increasingly awkward situation.

Another grunt.

"Well?"

"She, uh... she wants you down in the Clinic. She told me to say, erm, If you aren't down there in five minutes, she'll – uh – circumcise you and your boyfriend."

Surprisingly, a wry smile spread over House's lips, yet he made no move to pull away from Wilson's tensed body. Afterall, he had all of five minutes.

As Cameron left, he raised an eyebrow before giving her his final words.

"No need. He's already been done."


	2. Chapter 2

"You are impossible."

Following House out of the elevator, Wilson ran a hand through his hair self consciously, as if the deeds could somehow be perceived through his roots. While his hair was, as he suspected, decidedly ruffled and now refusing to be tamed, it was the guilty, shifty look that crawled through his features that was the real give away. As he tailed after House, his gaze darted left and right, playing over every person that crossed their path.

"Me? You're the only person who gets some then complains." House called back, limping quickly towards the Clinic. He could see Cuddy out of the corner of his eye, and she looked on the warpath. He just had to make it to the exam room...

"'Gets some'? The definition of 'getting some' isn't the same as 'being left on the edge'." Wilson retorted incredulously, picking up his pace to keep up with House. Unlike Greg, he hadn't seen Cuddy rampaging towards them from the stairs, and grabbed House's shoulder to keep him from entering the exam room. It was a fatal mistake.

"House!" The sharp tones of Lisa Cuddy pierced the air, and both of the men cringed visibly. As she neared them, gaining a few queer looks from the people in the waiting room, House hissed the word 'jackass' into Wilson's ear, to which he rolled his eyes as they prepared for the blow she would deliver.

"I needed you down here thirty eight minutes ago. Where have you been?" Standing in front of them, hands on her hips, she didn't look the woman to be trifled with. Her ebony hair was tied back in its usual ponytail, but wisps had escaped the tie as she had dashed from one end of her hospital to the other and were falling in front of her eyes. She brushed them away quickly.

"Wilson needed a hand – sorry." House replied, looking her straight in the eyes without so much as a twitch of a grin. Beside him, Wilson was biting the inside of his lips to stop himself breaking out into a smirk. While he tried to swallow the notion to snigger, Cuddy looking him up and down, evidently disapproving.

"That's not funny! Your patient has been in that room for half an hour, while you're upstairs fooling around with a member of my staff! What, you've corrupted yourself so you're starting on somebody else?"

Wilson could soon taste the metallic rasp of blood over his tongue as he bit deeper into his lower lip, desperate to keep himself from dissolving into fits of laughter. They would both receive the royal screwing-over if he lapsed into anything below composed.

"Well, he came onto me first." House replied, sticking out his lower lip. Apparently, that was the last straw for Wilson, who promptly covered his eyes with his hand, turned on his heel and fled for the main desk. House let a look of satisfaction flit over his face, but never turned away from Cuddy's gaze.

"You really should keep a tighter lock on the medicine cupboard." He sighed, tutting at Cuddy's stone-cast expression before pushing the exam room door open with his shoulder. As he limped into the room, quickly closing the door on the outside world, an almost impossibly smug smile fitted perfectly over his lips.

Leaning his back against the door, House closed his eyes as his head tilted back towards the ceiling. Perhaps there was a God to allow him such delicious situations...

"Are you Dr. House?"

An unsteady female voice cracked into his peace, and House's brow creased as he was forced to open his eyes. If there was a God, He took great delight in ruining things. The Ice Age, Pompeii, his daily life...

"Wish I wasn't." He replied, fishing in his pocket for his Vicodin. "Come on then, let's get this over with so I can get back to my show. What's up?"

Not surprisingly, the slender female sat upon the examination bed couldn't have looked more lost if she had tried.

"Well... uh. I have this thing on my arm. My boyfriend Steve knows this guy and he said it was noth--"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cut with the crap. Let me see." Heaving himself down into a chair against the wall, House swallowed the white pill and let his mind wander to means of escape from beneath Cuddy's nose.

Shrugging off her jacket, the girl slowly peeled away a thick wad of bandages covering her upper arm, unwinding them with a painful slowness. Yet even the motions seemed to throw her through agony and back, with Hell registering in her eyes as she neared the final layers. Making an untidy pile of the wrappings, she pulled them away fully, clearing her throat a little to get House's attention.

Turning back to her, House opened his mouth to let loose some snide comment or other. It stayed like that as he glanced at the sickening, green-tainted bulge that sprouted from her upper arm. It started beneath, the skin residing there now nothing more than a part of this pustule, and had spread to almost her shoulder. It looked as though she was wearing some sort of grotesque arm plate.

"Whoa."

House appeared gobsmacked. Gradually, he managed to get off the chair and inch back towards the door. Pulling it open, he stuck his head out, able to see Cuddy and Wilson engaged in some sort of an argument by the front desk.

"Hey – Wilson!" He hissed, gesturing for him to come over. "You need to see this."

As Wilson moved to step forward, every trace of mirth since leeched from his face, Cuddy shot out an arm to stop him and strode forward herself. Her mood hadn't mellowed.

"For God's sake, Greg! Just get in there and do your goddamn job. I don't even want to hear your _name _until your shift is over!"

"No. Seriously. You need to see this." He pushed the door open a little further with his cane, limping aside as she stormed in. She was followed by Wilson, who couldn't have looked happier at at his own funeral.

At least the sight of the growth shut Cuddy up. She drew a sharp breath, and took a half-step backwards into Wilson's chest.

"Th—that..." She stammered, the wisps of her hair falling into her eyes once more. She didn't brush them away.

"That's gangrene." Wilson breathed, Adam's Apple bobbing in his throat as he swallowed.

House nodded slowly, looking from his co-workers stunned faces to the female, who was nibbling her lip as they studied her.

"Gangrene."


	3. Chapter 3

_Yay for short, filler-type chapters._

"She's under anesthetic for the pain. Unless you want burbles, there's no hope of a family history."

Sitting in front of House's desk, Foreman had – once again – been elected the bearer of bad news. Apart from the girl's name, Sarah Lewis, or something along those lines, they knew nothing about her. The mysterious boyfriend hadn't shown so much as his hide, and database searches had yielded no results whatsoever. That meant that Eric was forced to slump in the chair, pick his nails and tell House they were pretty much screwed over.

Even though it wasn't their case, Foreman could sense House's interest. Gangrene wasn't really something that cropped up every day of the week, and the cause of this instance still hadn't been determined. Until all the loose ends had been tied, Foreman seriously doubted any of the team would get so much as a coffee break.

"Isn't that convenient?" House grumbled, fingers laced behind his head as he sprawled in his chair, not so much looking _at_ Foreman as looking_ around_ him. He had been doing it for the past half hour, and Foreman was starting to tire of _almost_ being watched.

"Wet Gangrene doesn't just spring up of its own accord." Tapping his fingers against the back of his head, House mused aloud, watching the people rush by outside his office. "Serious bacterial infection..."

"Well, unless we wake her up, we're not gonna know." Foreman sighed, stretching out his arms to try and get some feeling back. He had been sitting still for far too long.

"Why don't you?" House shot back quickly, still drumming a pattern into the base of his skull.

"What, and have her scream for three hours straight?" Eric scoffed slightly at the suggestion, before realizing House was deathly serious. Sitting up a little straighter, suddenly feeling a little nervous, he cleared his throat before speaking again.

"House, that poor woman's gonna loose her arm, and you want to put her through agony now? I knew you were jacked up in the head, but c'mon..."

"Hmm." Cutting him off with a sound of deep thought, House stopped his drumming and thought through the fog of his mind. They needed some sort of a history, just at least some indication of Diabetes or something else that would up the likelihood of gangrene. Something for the files. Whatever.

"Hey – Foreman. How are your lock picking skills?" He asked suddenly, completely ignoring the fact that Foreman had been speaking to him. For a moment, Eric looked bemused, but then an expression of 'oh, you're kidding me' slipped over his features.

"You want me to break into her house?" He asked, incredulously. Not again. He wasn't doing it again.

"That's a great idea!" House suddenly sat up in his chair, snapping his fingers. "Now, why didn't I think of that..."

Foreman rolled his eyes. Why was it that House could twist things to make him seem like nothing more than an ass every single time they spoke?

"Her address will be in the Clinic book. Go do your thing." House, having seemingly lost all interest in the conversation, turned his attentions to the TV.

Getting to his feet, Foreman turned to leave, undoubtedly irritated. Before he could even take two steps, however, House spoke once more to him.

"And take the wombat with you. Give him some exercise."


	4. Chapter 4

"What are we expecting to find?"

Chase's gloved fingers played over the dusty set of shelves as he moved through the room, Foreman leaving his side to expect a cabinet on the other side. He'd been dragged away from clinic duty, for which Cuddy would probably want his head on a silver platter, to dreg through a patient's apartment. Now, that would be all well and good and acceptable, except it wasn't even their damn patient. He was wasting time, albeit not valuable time, looking for... actually, he had no idea what they had been sent to find.

But it probably wouldn't be there, anyway.

"I dunno." replied a crouching Foreman, who was now picking out several vitamin bottles from the cabinet. Diabetes, House had said, or anything else that might give them an indicator of what had caused the gangrene. That wasn't much to go on, though; did the man want a festering blob of pus next to a dirty knife, or something? Would that be proof enough?

"Well why have you brought me, anyway? I could survive one day without following you around." Irritated tones crept into the Australian accent as Chase threw himself down on the couch in the center of the room, apparently throwing in the towel. It was utterly pointless, and he refused to make himself look like an idiot for House's enjoyment. He was just the resident clown.

"Hey! You think I wanted your whiny ass with me?" Eric rolled his eyes, closing the cabinet door and progressing into the kitchen. He left the door wide open, however, so he could continue talking – or arguing – with Robert. "House made me bring you. He just loves you like that."

Smirking some, Foreman opened the fridge and glanced over the contents, looking for any indication of a diabetic's diet. Lots of chocolate. Ordinary chocolate. Damn. So that theory was pretty much screwed over. Closing the refrigerator door, he began to search through the cupboards and drawers.

"All I ever get from him is an insult, and – if I'm real lucky? – a new nickname." Chase was sulking at his lack of respect from Greg, and crossed his arms over his beige blazer before deciding he should make some of his effort. Otherwise, it wouldn't only be his head on that silver platter. He got down to his knees and poked under the couch a bit.

"Oh, I'm sorry. You wanna be treated equal to me?" Eric walked back from the kitchen and closed the door behind him. "I'll get him to start calling you 'wigger' then." Raising his eyebrows significantly, even though Chase wasn't able to see, Foreman joined his break-in buddy and began looking under an armchair.

"Shut up. I just want him to start treating me less like a lap dog and more like a--" Frowning a little, Chase stopped himself speaking and reached further beneath the couch, fingers clasping around the ripped top of an open envelope. He pulled it out, and waved it before Foreman's eyes to get some attention.

"It's from us."

"Huh?" Foreman was still busy on his search, and didn't have enough care in the matter of a torn letter to utter much more than a grunted question.

"Princeton-Plansboro."

"Impossible. Her name would be on the database. Must be Princeton General."

"No, look. Plastic surgery unit." Chase jabbed the stamp on the envelope with his finger, and Foreman finally turned around and gave it a glance.

"That's a while different building."

"Under the same administration though. Same stressed-out chick signs their pay checks. Except while we're saving lives, they're cutting out fat and stuff."

"Okay, we get it. You don't like the cosmetics industry." Eric rapidly grew bored of Chase's rant, and took the envelope from the man's fingers to take a better look at it. Yup, Princeton-Plansboro Cosmetic Surgery Center.

"Think it's useful?" Chase asked, getting up off his knees.

"Not really. But House'll be dancing over your small intestine if we don't bring something back."


	5. Chapter 5

"I _said_: Hi, honey, I'm _home_!"

The sarcasm-laden tones of Gregory House filtered through the barely conscious mind of James Wilson, and it was that rough voice that made him blink a little. Finally tearing his dark eyes away from the TV, which he hadn't really been watching anyway, Wilson turned around just in time to see House slam the door shut for the second time, trying to gain some attention from the man commandeering his couch.

"Uh-- didn't I say...?"

Completely ignoring his companion's daze, House limped straight over to the kitchen. Once there, he began creating more noise than seemed humanly possible for one man and a refrigerator. Even James, in his out-of-it state, couldn't fail to notice that and winced a little at the clatter.

"We got any ham?" Greg yelled, sticking his head out of the room whilst Wilson struggled to focus on the show. But, somehow, House took up a lot more of his mind than a couple of washed-out White House delegates arguing. Jeez, afternoon shows were really rolling downhill...

"How should I know?" He shot back, still sounding pretty confused by the whole notion of House. Entering a room. Going into the kitchen. Yes, an incredibly difficult thought for a doctor to grasp, that one.

"Uh, cuz you eat it?" House ambled back over to the couch with what appeared to be a cheese and tomato explosion on a plate held in his right hand. James sighed at the mess, and at the fact he'd just been made to shift his legs down off the coffee table. So much for a relaxing afternoon off.

"Right. Because the Bible clearly states: 'go forth, kill swine and eat them for your own enjoyment whilst I go play some mini golf with my good friend Moses'." Wilson raised his eyebrows some before reaching over to grab some of House's makeshift sandwich. He received a slapped wrist for his efforts, and stuck both hands between his knees again.

"Why do you even say you're Jewish? _Bible_?"

"Torah. Yeah. I was just... testing you."

Greg snorted, which wasn't an entirely pleasant sound, seeing as he had two slices of bread, a lump of cheese and some totally shredded tomatoes shoved into his mouth. Evidently not a great believer in chewing, he wolfed it all down in mere seconds.

"Anyway. You _so_ do eat ham. Specifically pork."

"Is this going to be one of those times where you tell me I'm so totally not Kosher because I ate something out of a can where they breed pigs next door, or something? Because I can just switch off now--"

"--No. This is one of the times where I glanced down at the front of my pants, give you a meaningful look, then laugh at you for approximately three and a half minutes while you blush and go find something to busy yourself and try to escape innuendo I'll be dropping until you submit and I get my rocks off.."

"...Have you ever heard of the words 'there's a time, and a place'?"

"Nope, what about 'You're so gay, literally and metaphorically'?"

Wilson scowled at the taunting House, grabbing the plate straight out of the man's hand and marching into the kitchen, where he proceeded to make a racket of his own by doing some incredibly noisy washing up. It was only a plate, with a few scraps Greg hadn't managed to lick up, yet still it sounded like a one man band was parading down the sideboard.

"You're so pathetic," He heard House mutter, before the TV was switched off and three legs – one of them artificial – padded along the floor to stand a little way off James' back. He felt eyes upon him, and tried to concentrate. Sadly, it didn't work.

"If you've got a problem with me, say it. Now. Right?"

"Not right." Muttered Wilson beneath his breath.

"_Yes_ right! Jesus, what's got into you?"

"Nothing!" James shoved the plate onto the draining board and gripped the edge of the sink, yet he didn't turn around. Instead, he stared blankly at the water draining down the plug. It only seemed to piss Greg off even more.

"I know what this is. I know why you get mad at me if I so much as _think_ about sex before 10PM, when all the lights are off and all the windows closed. You're just scared."

"Of what?" James' knuckles tightened over the cold metal.

"This; us! So you're fine to prance about the hospital trying to get into my pants, but the moment we get home and it gets all... _domestic_, you get scared because I haven't got breasts."

"Yeah, that's right. I need breasts to survive. Good deduction, House. Top notch." Wilson turned abruptly, staring House straight in the eye for a while. The testosterone was flooding the room, and it became a game of chicken, which one of them would shy away first. House wasn't even blinking, just smirking at his friend's – his boyfriend's, rather, just to rub it in slightly more – anger-stricken expression.

As it turned out, the curt ringing of a phone was the one thing that sliced the heavy silence, and James turned away quickly, staring at the floor beside his feet and swallowing. House let himself snicker as he turned around and felt in his pockets for his cell. As he hit answer, James breezed past him and slammed the bedroom door closed behind him sharply.

"House? What was that?" Cameron's slightly anxious voice filtered through to Greg's audio senses, and he winced. Brilliant. Allison the Wonder Dog. Did she ever stop worrying about what he did? "I heard a noise--"

"Wilson. He's such a baby when he bottoms." That shut her up rather quickly, and House limped around to the other side of the kitchen, throwing himself down into a chair. He'd left before Chase and Foreman had got back, so he hoped this was about something useful and not just her panicking about his life in general.

"Erm... we, uh-- we found something. At the apartment. It's not much, but we thought that maybe--"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Spill. Can't keep my lover-boy waiting, can I?" He growled the words, using his shoulder to keep the phone to his ear as he ran both hands through his hair. The evening hadn't gone nearly as well as he'd hoped. She really wasn't helping.

"Letter. She went under the knife a few weeks ago."

"I hope the next words out of your mouth are 'for gangrene'."

"No. Plastic surgery."

Greg was teetering on the verge of exploding at his unfortunate Duckling, because that – on the surface – was to blatantly irrelevant that a three year old couldn't even link them. He wasn't interested in past surgeries, only if she was diabetic or any other number of conditions that could have contributed to gangrene. But then it hit him, with all the force of a ten tonne truck carrying hardcore porn.

"Wait there. I'll be fifteen minutes."

With that short ending, he cut the line and rammed the phone back into the front pocket of his blue jeans. Why hadn't he considered that? It was so blindingly obvious now! Grabbing his backpack from the counter he'd thrown it to, House snatched his bike keys and limped for the door. He was a step outside when he heard the pitiful sounds stemming from his bedroom. A few scraping noises accompanied it, and a ruffled head stuck out from the door frame.

"Don't go." A quiet voice pleaded. It was easy to tell when Wilson was upset, when he was struggling not to cry or let on he was upset. His voice always got lower, his words always weaker. Greg didn't meet his eye, instead bouncing the keys up and down in his right palm. He could stay and bark orders down the phone at Foreman, telling his Ducklings to do the dirty work as he let James stroke his chest and try patch things up between them.

"Gotta." House shrugged his shoulders and closed the door with a snap.


End file.
